16 pages iMac vs. iMac Anandtech is at it again. If you're undecided whether to get the old or the new iMac, this is your review. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 22:21 [article link]  0 comments

Adobe preparing for intel transition MacCentral has an update on the transition from Adobe. Other sources tell us that Adobe won't make the Creative Suite 2 universal. Rather, Adobe is currently developing CS 3 and will release that as a Universal Binary instead. However, they're making sure that CS 2 runs well in Rosetta.
Adobe CS 3 is expected to be relased sometime in Summer 2006. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 02:07 [article link]  0 comments

iTMS Germany: Leader? Last week, German T-Online's MusicLoad claimed they were number one in Germany's digital music download marked according to IFPI's numbers, with 15 mio downloads per year. Now, Apple claims they have 15.5 mio downloads per year (link in German).
According to the linked heise.de article, IFPI claimed that all other music services shared about 6 mio downloads for the year 2005, but critics already claimed that this number was far too low. Besides: T-Online's 15 mio number contained 1.5 percent songs given away for marketing, whereas Apple's 15.5 mio number is without any free song-downloads. World-wide, Apple's iTMS claims more than 80 percent market share (according to Apple), but in Europe, where iTMS was particularly late (and others started early), Apple actually had a fight to win. Apparently, they're doing just this.
Update: heise.de updates their article with information that IFPI says their preliminary number did not contain individual songs from album sales, only single sales. Complete numbers would not be released until March 21st 2006. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 12:24 [article link]  0 comments

Lasseter kills Toy Story 3 About 24h after the Pixar/Disney deal went through, John Lasseter went to Disney and killed the Toy Story 3 project, which had about 100 creative people in a team at Disney, apparently. This should get interesting. :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 22:50 [article link]  3 comments

Running Windows XP on intel Macs Update Computer Guru has an idea. Whether it will work like this or not remains to be seen, as he hasn't got the necessary intel Mac. But I'm sure someone will try this soon enough. The process talks about booting the Mac from a Vista installation DVD, which currently doesn't work. So we're still not there just yet. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 22:18 [article link]  0 comments

Ads again? You crazy? Nah, nah. ;) ... I hope you don't mind much. Back when I had to switch to blogger.com because my previous setup stopped working, because my provider had to update Perl and no-one apparently could really find out why blosxom stopped working for me (or rather how to make it work again...), I had problems integrating the Google Ads with the macnews.net.tc layout. Now I simply put them somewhere else. If you're interested in one of the linked products or services, please *do* click on the links, since it helps my motivation. :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 01:23 [article link]  0 comments

Read up on Steve Jobs at the Magic Kingdom BusinessWeek has a very good article about Steve Jobs/Pixar/Disney/Apple for you to read. If you're like me (an Apple fan and critic for quite some time), you're interested in what they have to say about it.
I personally still have ambiguous feelings about Steve Jobs being on Disney's board of directors. After all: Disney's a biggie, even if they're suffering. Could have some not-so-positive impact on future deals with other media companies. And I love seeing Apple succeed with iTunes/iPod and - after all with it - the Mac.
Btw.: Next year is Steve's 10th anniversary being back at Apple. Has it really been that long since Apple sucked and got turned around by Steve? :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 23:20 [article link]  0 comments

Aperture Universal Binary update will be free Apple changed the wording of the crossgrade offer at their Aperture page. Previously, all Pro apps were said to cost 49 USD for a crossgrade from the latest version to the Universal Binary. Users are urging Apple to stop asking for money for these "crossgrades", since they're not functionality updates, but merely compatbility updates. – The reasoning of the users is of course this: "I've bought a professional application that runs only well on the newest Macs. Now when I buy an even *newer* Mac, you ask for money because *you've* changed the underlying architecture?!" I think those users are right.
The Universal Binary update to Aperture will be downloadable through Software Update. Just like it should. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 23:23 [article link]  0 comments

iWork '06 Short Verdict Update... I recently posted this blurb and have to take it back. Although I still think performance should be better, it seems that somehow, something was wrong with my computer's config that day. Strange enough, though, that it was only Pages that showed the incredible slowness. Maybe it doesn't do well once the system's RAM is filled with too many applications etc.? Either way: Pages 2.0's lag problem is not as bad as I initially assumed based on my short testing period. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 23:15 [article link]  0 comments

Apple seeds Mac OS X 10.4.5 8H5 more widely Apple apparently has seeded build 8H5 more widely now and first reports are trickling in that the build is "okay, stable". According to our sources, there are no known issues mentioned in the current build, but this of course doesn't mean there actually aren't any issues.
The Mac OS X 10.4.5 update will bring sport improvements in Apple Software Restore, file system drivers, the "system blessing" command "bless", a lot of other things, WebCore (direct SVG support, probably) as well as the Dock. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 01:22 [article link]  1 comments

Apple starts Mac OS X 10.4.5 development Shortly after the release of the 10.4.4 update, Apple has started development on Mac OS X 10.4.5. Current builds around 8H5 are tested internally and with a chosen few developers outside of Apple. Safari performance, Core Graphics applications and the Mac OS X Dock are asked to be tested. The combo updater of the PPC version should be around 120 MB in size. We'll report development of the next update to Tiger for you – as usual. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 23:08 [article link]  0 comments

N.Y. Times loves new iMac Well: It's David Pogue, so it's not that surprising. After all, he's a long-time Mac lover and had good things to say about the previous model. And after all, the new iMac is the same, only faster, right? ;) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 22:35 [article link]  0 comments

intel iMac's performance Seems to me "the press" is just looking for ways to bash the new iMac. "Only 1/4 times faster, not four times" could be read at several places in the last couple of days, completely forgetting that the "4-5 times as fast" claim was about the MacBook Pro vs. PowerBook G4, not the iMac. Apple clearly said the new iMac's chip (i.e. the intel core duo processor) is twice as fast (not two times faster, actually, Steve Jobs seems to mix those things sometimes...) as the single core G5 used in the previous version. This statement is still true, although real-world tasks might see only about a 25% performance increase. The SPEC benchmarks don't lie, they're just irrelevant. Add to that Rosetta's performance hit for PPC software, and the iMac Core Duo just doesn't look as good as Steve Jobs has made it look at MWSF at the beginning of the month. But: Non-universal binaries are only a short-term problem. Since you buy an iMac for at least one year of use, I'd say, it's still the much better choice now. Not only will it give you roughly 25% more oomph (that's quite a bit, actually) for native applications, but more importantly, it'll keep its value longer. If you want to sell your iMac in, say, two years, the intel iMac will still be a nice machine, whereas the iMac G5 might have some nostalgic value, but will otherwise be looked at as an oddity from the past.
So if you're about to buy a Mac this year, I'll advise you to buy the intel version whenever possible. The only exceptions to this rule for me are the Mac mini and the iBook. The Mac mini is cheap enough to be looked at as a "disposable computer". Buy it for 499 USD, sell it a year later for 300 and pay another 200 to get a new, shiny intel Mac mini. That's a nice upgrade path in my opinion, that'll keep you more or less up-to-date. The iBook, although still using that "old, power-hungry G4 processor", is a very nice entry-level notebook that gives you 5-6 hours of battery life per charge. They're nice little fellas that, for the money, give you a lot in their life-time. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 18:38 [article link]  1 comments

iWork '06 Short Verdict If it ain't ready, don't publish it. – I want to keep this short. Haven't tapped into Keynote much yet (opened an older project just fine, exported fine, looks fine), but I'm often writing texts using Pages. And I have to say this: Pages 2.0 (iWork '06) using the same no-frills template of my own (just a "title" and "text" paragraph and font definition, really) sucks. Big time. I'm using a PowerBook G4 15" 1.33 GHz with a GB of RAM, which certainly should be enough for word processing (and it is, if I'm using Word, TextEdit, BBEdit or basically anything else including Pages 1.x), but with Pages 2.0, the dreaded "hey wait, I'm not there yet" lagging cursor of writer's death is back. It's so bad that I find myself writing text in TextEdit, copying it over to my template later in the process. So if Pages was a mediocre wordprocessing and a mediocre layout application, Pages 2.0 makes it "more mediocre" at best. Not good, Apple. Fix it ASAP, please. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 17:49 [article link]  0 comments

Newton, the un-dead... Just looking at this slideshow showing Einstein, a Newton emulator, on a Nokia 770 webpad, brings back some memories. What if someone will one day build hardware specifically for running Einstein? Would there finally be a PDA worth the term "Personal Digital Assistant" again?
Of course by now, requirements for a PDA have changed drastically. WiFi and GPRS connections as well as Bluetooth are a must, so is decent music and video playback and: Support for a colour screen. Actually, I think only Apple could fulfill my PDA dreams. Newton OS 3 or something of the kind. Although it'd probably be called the "iPod pro", since "Newton" isn't exactly Steve's baby. ;) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:37 [article link]  0 comments

Some harddrives incompatible with intel iMacs? According to this user's post on xlr8yourmac.com, some harddrives might have a hard time inside an intel iMac, should you try to replace the one it comes with with a bigger one.
The problem seems to be that Disk Utility on the installation DVD-ROM can format external drives (FW/USB-2) with the correct format (using GPT, the "GUID partitioning table"), but doesn't allow this on the internal drive. At least not with the particular WD4000KD drive the user was trying it on. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 15:04 [article link]  0 comments

Using Lexar Secure II equipped USB sticks? If you are, you might want to think about it again. But only if you're eager to ever watch a DVD on your Mac again. Strange bug, this. MacBidouille reports this (in French): The security software found on the Lexar USB sticks, if activated, installs "LexarFilterScheme.kext". After that kernel extension is loaded and you feed your Mac a commercial video DVD, the Mac simply says it cannot read the disk and asks you to "ignore" or "eject" the disk. Get rid of the extension, and you're good again. Lexar's website does not mention the bug yet. But maybe they will some day release an update.
For those who still want to encrypt files on a USB stick on the fly: Simply create a secure disk image on the stick's volume using Disk Utility. Mac OS X has software for encryption, after all. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 14:48 [article link]  0 comments

Welcome the "Pixar and Disney animation studios" Wow. What a name. At least "Pixar" isn't gone just yet. But today, Disney has finally bought Pixar. And thus ended the idea of a Pixar movie in cinemas without Disney's nod for approval. Hopefully, this means good things for both companies, rather than bad news for Pixar. Steve Jobs, as anticipated, gets a chair in Disney's board. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 23:23 [article link]  0 comments

Opera Mini for everyone... While we don't particularly like Opera's desktop webbrowser, their browsers for smartphones and other mobile phones are actually great. The best out there, so far. (Nokia's Safari-based mobile webbrowser isn't exactly available to everyone, is it.) Starting today, you can get Opera Mini for your phone, too. (Previously, it was restricted to some countries.) At least, if it's in the supported-phones list, but that list is big, I can tell you. If your phone isn't listed, choose one that is technologically similar to yours and it might work, too. You'll need a GPRS or 3G net-connection, of course. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 12:19 [article link]  0 comments

Booting WinXP on intel Macs: One step closer? Obviously (although not to those dorks who tried to "put a Windows CD in the drive and press C"), the EFI in intel Macs doesn't out-of-the-box support booting Windows XP installation CDs. But this shows that one can enter the EFI by actually installing an intel default EFI thingie (not really my field, sorry...). But one shouldn't mistake the blurry pictures for the actual EFI shell Apple has put inside the intel Macs. Apparently, what you see there is what's loaded from the intel-EFI software that first has to be installed in order to get there. Either way: One can actually _see_ a Windows Vista installation from that menu. What's needed now, apparently, are drivers for the EFI to be able to boot from those Windows drives etc. I'm pretty sure we'll hear more about this in the coming weeks. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:21 [article link]  0 comments

Jobs' jobs... Remember when Steve Jobs announced that Disney's ABC TV shows came to iTunes Music Store and the iPod video? They were joking on stage about the Pixar-Disney relationship. This is kind of a long story, though. Pixar's been working with Disney for twelve years, and at several points in time, there were rumours that Disney would buy Apple, but recently there have been new twists. Like Steve Jobs becoming chairman of Disney. Or the WSJ today saying that Disney's trying to buy Pixar. Either way: It seems that after all, Pixar probably will stay connected to Disney one or the other way, even after "Cars", the last production in the current (ended) Pixar-Disney contract.
Personally, I was hoping that Pixar would find a way to not only create family-entertainment, but more serious 3D animation films, too. Not that I dislike what Pixar's done so far. But I do see potential in Pixar that Disney just wouldn't let happen under their reign.
But even if Disney buys Pixar and Steve becomes chairman at Disney, I guess it would only mean good news for Apple's iTunes and iPod. Or would such a position of Jobs endanger future deals with other companies? Time will tell... - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 15:09 [article link]  0 comments

iTunes MiniStore now kindly asks for permission to spy. ;) When Apple released iTunes 6.0.2 at MWSF, people were a bit put off, to say the least, by the automatic appearance of the so-called "MiniStore", a feature which looks at what you're listening to and sends this information along with a unique ID which also includes your Apple User ID to the iTunes Music Store to give you a list of tracks you might want to buy. While Apple says the information is not stored but merely used to send you ads, the "feature" still looks like a privacy issue to most users.
Today, Apple changed its behaviour. It now asks you for permission before activating the MiniStore and shows you how to turn the feature off (Cmd-Shift-"M" does the trick quickly). While Apple's move to even include the MiniStore might be viewed as a bad one, their quick response to users' concerns certainly has to be applauded. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:20 [article link]  0 comments

Ars looks at the iMac Core Duo In their 8 page "first look" article, ArsTechnica finds good things to say about the new iMac. I wonder whether giving that iMac 1 GB or 2 GB instead of the built-in 512 MB of memory would've positively affected the benchmarks (I seriously guess so and don't understand why this isn't really mentioned as a problem for the "nice graphs"...), but still: It fared well.
Obviously, Rosetta can be a problem, but apparently, it's not much of a problem for everyday tasks like opening/editing the occasional Excel file in Office 2004. Even in Photoshop, it's not totally unusable, although some filters and rotations might make you wait a little longer. I wouldn't mind much – as long as the interface stays responsive. And according to the article, it's okay, to say the least. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:12 [article link]  2 comments

intel Transition: OS X/intel & Windows/Mac Two things of interest with the arrival of the first intel Macs. Will the release version of Mac OS X 10.4.4 (intel) run on any PC? Will intel Mac users be able to install and boot Windows XP? There's been talk about both ever since WWDC 2005 in June last year, and we're going to keep you updated from time to time.
Currently, there's no way of installing an intel iMac's OS X on the "any PC". Apparently, older hacks that enabled PC users to use illegal copies of the developer kit hardware on their PCs don't work. Yet. However: One can be sure that efforts are underway, and from a hardware point of view, the intel Macs don't look very different from a PC now.
One difference is that intel Macs use EFI instead of BIOS to boot. And this is what's keeping intel Mac users currently from installing Windows XP. However: Similarly to the other 'problem', people are looking into finding a way of "preparing" an intel Mac to "take" a Windows XP installation. Windows Vista will offer EFI support according to Microsoft, Windows XP won't. (Only the Itanium version does, but that's incompatible with the intel Macs, anyway.) Apple says they didn't actively hinder users to use Windows on intel Macs, but that doesn't mean they would help them, either. Apple is helping Microsoft to bring VirtualPC to intel Macs as soon as possible, according to Microsoft, and there will be other ways of running Windows software while booted into Mac OS X (WINE project, Crossover Office, VMware etc.).
Currently, neither can "any PC" users install OS X 10.4.4 on their machines, nor can intel Mac users run Windows applications on theirs. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 13:52 [article link]  0 comments

Phishing Apple's users... Apparently, there's been a (little?) flood of E-Mail scams recently that aims at users of Apple. The E-Mails aim at getting your Apple user ID and password. So if you receive mail that asks for such or sends you to a page that does, be very careful. Well: Always be careful if you enter an ID and password, of course.
Btw.: This is not like a virus or anything that uses a system's lack of security. It's a scam that uses your lack of security. ;) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 11:33 [article link]  0 comments

Apple's Terminology Problems? "We're using intel's new dual-core processor, the 'Core Duo', with the MacBook Pro", you said, Steve. Everything alright, so far. But then you go on to add: "Each chip is as fast as a G5, and the MacBook Pro has two of them!" Now we're in trouble, Steve... Throughout your keynote, you made it very difficult for ordinary people to understand, what exactly is inside a MacBook Pro or an iMac. Is it two processors? One? One dual-core processor or two of those? Or is it rather like the following statement that reminds me of an old Monty Python's joke? -> "It has a dual core processor. That's actually two processors. And every processor has two cores, which means two processors. So it has four processor. And each of those has two cores..."

PLEASE, Apple! Get your terminology right. The new iMac and the new MacBook Pro have _one_ intel core duo processor per machine. Each processor has two cores. Which still makes it _one_ processor. Not two. Thank you. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:15 [article link]  1 comments

The possibilities... There's new talk about intel's new processors. For one thing, intel is readying a Celeron part based on the single core "core solo" processor. According to our sources, Apple will likely use a "core solo" part for the MacBook (iBook), but might use a Celeron version for products like the eMac and Mac mini.
But could processors like the "1.06GHz U2500", a dual core processor for ultra-low-voltage use, be of interest for Apple, too? Surely, this processor would still give performance better than the PowerBooks and iBooks with G4 processors, but could be used in a notebook that reaches close to 8 hours of battery life. Apple asked us to imagine the possibilities, so: Yes, we are... - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 13:09 [article link]  0 comments

iMac open Kodawarisan of "I'll rip apart any new Mac sooner than anyone else" fame has done it again. Since the intel iMac's page on Kodawarisan is currently unavailable, we'll just link to the mirror site on Kodawarisan. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 02:47 [article link]  0 comments

intel Transition Review (Part 1) (From time to time, I'll now post updates to this article.) From the very beginning, I was both happy with Apple's move to intel and skeptical. Skeptical not because I thought Apple should stay with the PowerPC architecture, but because it's the third transition of the Mac and because both earlier transitions had proven more difficult for the professional Mac user than it originally seemed (or Apple made it seem, that is). Now that Apple has announced-slash-released the first intel Macs, it's time to take a look at where we stand and what the current short- and longterm outlook is.

In June 2005, Apple announced that within a year, Apple would move the first Macs to intel's forthcoming processors. So actually, Apple is a bit early with the MacBook Pro and the new iMac. However: That does in no way mean that the transition has been advanced. By no means are the professional applications ready for the MacBook Pro (and I'm looking at this transition mainly from a pro's perspective)! Not only does Apple only deliver their Pro applications in March, but the current versions don't run in Rosetta emulation, showing off a particularly critical thing about the transition: While Rosetta now also emulates a G4 processor and can translate AltiVec code, there's still that thing in my head that says "my apps might run on an intel Mac, but they probably won't". We had similar "easy transition" promises with the two earlier transitions. From 68K to the PowerPC, it was that the PowerPC emulated an 68020 processor without FPU, which enabled not only apps to run at all, but also enabled parts of the System (then not called Mac OS until Mac OS 7.5.1) to run, which resulted in slow performance.
Similarly, "Classic" enabled some OS 8.x/9.x applications to run within OS X, but that certainly wasn't a good enough experience for many professionals. Most pros simply didn't switch to OS X until MS Office, Adobe's and Macromedia's suites were ported. Quark was very late to the OS X game, resulting in more sales for Adobe's InDesign. Quark now already has a beta of XPress running on intel Macs, so this is a good sign. Adobe (incl. Macromedia now) and Microsoft, however, have nothing but promise to show currently.
So while the MacBook Pro might offer 4-5 times the (processor/bus) performance of its predecessors, this simply can't be the time for a pro to buy such a MacBook, since looking at an application failing to run at 4-5 times the speed that it actually runs on a PowerBook is not gonna be any good.

It's clear to me that Apple announced the MacBook Pro to show confidence in their move to users and to show developers that it's time they made their apps compatible with the new platform. I certainly hope that the major software vendors are ready soon enough. Apple doesn't give them much time: They want all product lines to run on intel hardware by the end of the year. But when you get your new intel Mac and try to work with it and your main applications have been ported, there might still be the odd application that is no longer developped. It would probably have run just fine on a G5, G6 or G7 system for years to come, but the move to intel might kill it, if it doesn't run in Rosetta emulation. Or it'll have limited performance running on emulation, which can be a drag and annoyance, to say the least. Sure: It'll run faster on a 3 GHz intel Mac (sometime in 2006 or 2007?) than your old 2 GHz PowerPC, but compared to the other apps you're using, it'll feel like moving through jelly instead of air. Let's just hope this transition will be quicker than the earlier two. Those took 5 years each (not for every user, of course, it depends on what your specific needs are). That's too long.

On a personal note: I intend to test the waters with the iBook's replacement, which will probably be released in the coming two months (Apple strategically changed the idea of moving the iBooks to intel before the PowerBooks, but the iBooks are still ready!). I intend to mainly use that for writing, should the pro apps refuse to run or run unacceptably slow – and keep my PowerBook G4 for the time being. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:45 [article link]  0 comments

Free Windows Media QT plugin - from Microsoft It's still Flip4Mac, but now you can get it for free from MS. It's not a full version (playback only, apparently), but works nice. Nicely done, Microsoft. I hope it doesn't contain any system damaging hacks. ;) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 00:49 [article link]  0 comments

iTunes 6.0.2 Shortly after the QT update, Apple has also released an 18.9 MB sized update to iTunes. The new version mentions solving stability issues. The update also adds an incredibly ugly "Mini Store" which is automatically shown in your Library at the bottom of the screen. It's like web-ads, only less ignorable. :/ Cmd-Shift-"M" removes it. :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 22:13 [article link]  0 comments

Keynote Live Coverage Covered. For future reference, you'll find our live coverage here. The "live" link will be changed when we're covering the next keynote. We want to thank you for following the keynote live via our site (if you did so, that is). There's been a tremendous amount of traffic, of course, but our servers were handling it very well, thanks to the slimmed down design of the live-page. We hope you enjoyed the ride and look forward to the rest of 2006. :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 21:02 [article link]  0 comments

Mac OS X 10.4.4: Don't use SU, please. As has been revealed to me shortly before the keynote today, Apple will release Mac OS X 10.4.4 through Software Update today. (Update 00:19h: It has now...) However: I urge you not to update until the combo updater will be available, and then use that one instead. It's generally viewed as safer, and also you'll have the updater at hand for other machines that need updating or if you want to reinstall Tiger.
Update: The combo updater is now available from this page. As anticipated first by our site, 10.4.4 made it into its thirties: 8G32 is the build number, whereas most other sites were predicting the update would be released before Christmas. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:52 [article link]  0 comments

Apple's Pro apps: Wait 'til March As we mentioned in our live coverage, Pro apps will not be universal until March. What we missed (or Steve didn't say it...) was that "Pro applications from Apple — including Final Cut Pro, Motion, Soundtrack Pro, DVD Studio Pro, Aperture, Logic Pro, Logic Express, and Final Cut Express — are not supported by Rosetta". This is what they say on their Rosetta page now. So: If you plan on using pro software, don't buy your MacBook Pro just yet. The models you can buy in March might have a couple less "early-adopter-issues", but more importantly, the software will be ready by then, too. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:31 [article link]  0 comments

Nightly WebKit builds You can get them here. Don't misunderstand this: This is not new versions of Safari, i.e. you won't see new features in the app itself. But its core will be updated compared to what you get with Safari out of the box. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:18 [article link]  0 comments

QuickTime 7.0.4 released ... through Software Update. A 50 MB update. Probably required to watch the stream of the MWSF keynote (link currently still dead at the time of posting, but will be activated soon)? - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 20:04 [article link]  0 comments

Keynote over. Here's the fluff. :) You can read our whole live coverage here. But basically, we've seen iLife '06, iWork '06 (well, not actually seen that, but announced...) as well as the new iPod remote with FM-tuner built in. And then some...
The all new iMac. It's the same as before, but with a new graphics card - and more importantly a new intel core duo CPU. The dual core intel CPU should (according to Apple) be 2-3 times as fast as the G5 used in the previous iMac generation.
The MacBook Pro. 15.4" models for now only. About 4-5 times as fast as previous PowerBooks. Bit slimmer than the old 17" model, integrated iSight, FrontRow with IR sensor and remote control. Comes as 1.67 GHz model for 1999 USD and as 1.83 GHz model for 2499 USD. You can still get 12/15/17 inch models with PowerPC. But I guess not many of those will be sold now that the first intel machines are available.
Apparently, the new MacBook Pro does only have one FW 400 port. No more FW 800 for pros? On the other hand, it's got an ExpressCard slot which could make up for it. Also: intel has announced intel core duo processors at speeds between 1.67 and 2.16 GHz. Here's to the hope that Apple will add a 2.16 GHz model as soon as the chips are available. :/ - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 19:50 [article link]  0 comments

Keynote live coverage Our live coverage will start at 18.00 CET, when the keynote officially begins. The link is already active. All information we'll post there, will later be brought to a report here on our normal page. Have fun, it's an interesting day. :) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 12:51 [article link]  0 comments

Behind the scenes of a Stevenote Yes, we're all waiting impatiently until Steve Jobs enters the stage next Tuesday. If you want a bit of background information about Steve's MacWorld keynotes, you just have to read this. Mike Evangelist, ex-Apple employee working on iDVD and later on FCP, too, sheds some light on what it takes to prepare such a show. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:16 [article link]  0 comments

The iBook nano (wish) Let me dream. :) The keyboard of the iBook nano can be a little bit smaller than "real size". 80 or 90 percent, I'd say. That defines the width of the device. The trackpad doesn't have to be too big either to save space, too. The screen should be wide, of course. An optical drive is not necessary. (You can buy an external USB-2 DVD-RW, Apple could provide one, too.) The "harddrive" would be 32 or 48 GB NAND flash memory. Its processor would be of the ultra-low-voltage variant, intel has been doing those for a while, they're actually good.
If you connect the device to your "real" Mac, it could either act as the main harddrive of the "bigger" Mac, act as your home folder on any Mac or simply synch (probably better, because that'd mean a good backup, too) to that Mac. It'd make a very good ultra-portable with no moving parts besides the keys. It could give you six or more hours of battery life and actually be _the_ device to watch movies on.
The real problem would probably be its price. But one can dream. (I'll continue to repeat this until it happens, I guess...) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 14:47 [article link]  0 comments

Anandtech's Centrino Duo test While previous Yonah tests by anandtech looked at the new mobile processor as a low-power desktop alternative, this time, they compare a Centrino Duo notebook against its Centrino predecessor. The outcome is clear, although not overwhelming: Centrino Duo gives a little more battery life at much better overall performance. This will certainly make a good starting point for Apple to go into this intel business.
The notebooks used for the tests are Asus notebooks. Asus is rumoured to be one of two companies to actually produce Apple intel i- and PowerBooks. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 12:48 [article link]  0 comments

iWeb part of iLife '06 A new part of iLife (version '06) will be called iWeb. The application will be used to create simple webpages with - as expected with iLife products - templates. Hopefully, though, it'll also be possible to do more advanced things with it. No further information is currently available about this product, but it'll be part of iLife '06, which will be released at MWSF. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 18:32 [article link]  0 comments

Apple's Universal Binaries... The recent AirPort updaters from Apple are Universal Binaries as this (french) MacBidouille article shows (and you can verify if you look at the updater in Tiger's Finder). The question that forms, however, is what Apple applications will be universal once the first intel Macs actually ship.
So let's take for granted - for the moment, anyway - that Apple releases (and ships) an iBook, PowerBook and/or Mac mini with an intel Yonah processor next week. iLife '06 as well as iWork '06 have been confirmed by our sources to be released at MWSF, and we can safely assume that those apps will be Universal Binaries. Here's to hoping that Apple's professional software isn't far behind. Recent releases like Aperture, however, are still compiled for PowerPC only. The only Apple software publicly released as Universal Binaries are aforementioned AirPort updaters. Still: If Apple plans to introduce intel Mac hardware as soon as next week, I guess that all application updates from Apple will come as Universal Binaries after that. If only to set a good example for other developers. Surely, some apps can be used in Rosetta emulation, but we don't want to see that nice technology in too much action. Let this transition be as short as possible... - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:03 [article link]  0 comments

If there was an iPod mini, it could have 10 GB now. Yep. Cornice today announced 10 GB 1" harddisks at CES in Las Vegas. Now that there's no more iPod mini, though, Apple simply doesn't have a product that those drives would fit in. They could theoretically release a smaller version of the iPod video, but for video content, the 10 GB drive wouldn't make much sense, and the iPod video already is very thin, so a 10 GB version could merely reduce the screen size, basically. ;) ... I guess Apple will not make use of this evolutionary step in mini-sized harddrives. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 16:15 [article link]  0 comments

All your base are belong to Google. We've reported our paranoid feelings about this a couple of times, but this new rumour is certainly a sign that we're not paranoid just yet. Google wants to be your "web" (search), Google wants to be your news, Google wants to have all your E-Mail, all your pictures and videos as well as your databases. And now, Google wants to replace Microsoft by producing a Google PC with a Google OS. Certainly: A Walmart (cheap) PC with a bundled OS that (seemingly) costs nothing could be a good deal for many. Sure enough, many would replace the Google OS on it with Windows or linux, but the thought alone that Google could reach more market share than Apple in a matter of weeks or months... ;) - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 11:46 [article link]  0 comments